Year of the . . . beast

Back to the blog . . . after a big gap. It's been a busy time, both on The South China Morning Post and with my band Red Star Rising. But, here we are again, doing blog catch-up, and here's a post I meant to put up a month ago during Chinese New Year festivities. It may be Year of the Rat, but the beast photographed above was more dragon than rodent, and was going from shop to shop in Yung Shue Wan on Lamma Island collecting Lai See, the traditional Chinese New Year gift (usually even cash in a small red packet). In this case there were also gifts of fruit and vegetables. The beast - nian in Chinese - is said to be a protector in folklore. This is how its origins are described at a site about a dragon year:

Chinese New Year, pronounced in Chinese as xin nian, always falls on the date of marking the beginning of the spring and thus it is also called the Spring Festival. Xin means "new" and nian means "year". There are many stories told about the origin of nian . . .

The old story says that the beast nian with a very big mouth was so fierce and could swallow many people in one single bite. People were very scared. An old man offered to subdue nian and said to nian: "I hear that you are very capable, but can you swallow the other beasts instead of people who are by no means of your worthy opponents?" So nian swallowed many of the other beasts that hurt people and their domestic animals. The old man turned out to be an immortal god and riding the beast nian flew to heaven. Now that nian was gone and other beasts were also scared into forests, people began to enjoy their peaceful life. Before the old man left, he told people to put up red paper decorations on their windows and doors at each year's end to scare away nian in case it sneaked back again, because red was the colour the beast feared the most.

From then on, the term guo nian had the meaning of "pass over" or "survive" the nian. By tradition, Chinese businesses had to pay off all their debts by the end of the year.

So there you have it, and if you want to know more about Year of the Rat, I found this offering on the Web:

According to the Chinese Zodiac, the Year of 2008 is a Year of the Rat (Earth), which begins on February 7, 2008 and ends on January 25, 2009. First in the cycle of 12 Animal signs, Rat Year begins the sequence and recurs every twelfth year. It is a time of renewal in so many ways. From New Year to Valentine's Day, to the arrival of spring, may all the blessings and delights of the New Year be yours.

A Rat Year is a time of hard work, activity, and renewal. This is a good year to begin a new job, get married, launch a product or make a fresh start. Ventures begun now may not yield fast returns, but opportunities will come for people who are well prepared and resourceful. The best way for you to succeed is to be patient, let things develop slowly, and make the most of every opening you can find. People born in an Earth Rat are said to be logical realists, shrewd, charming, ambitious, and inventive. Of course, the entire horoscope must be considered when making any personality assessment.

In Chinese, the Rat is respected and considered a courageous, enterprising person. People born in the Year of Rat are clever and bright, sociable and family-minded. They have broad interests and strong ability in adapting to the environment and able to react adequately to any changes.

They are gifted in many ways and have an easy going manner. They are active and pleasant, tactful and fantastic, and are able to grasp opportunities. They seem to have interests in everything and hope to participate in doing it and usually do it very well.

Pictures taken with the Ricoh Caplio GX100